Military Service and Health Outcomes in Later Life

描述(由申请者提供)：25年来，关于服兵役如何塑造男性人生轨迹的问题在文献中得到了有限但持续的关注。虽然已经有许多研究考察了心理健康，但关于服兵役对晚年身体健康结果的影响的研究一直很有限。有大量关于退伍军人身体健康的文献；然而，这些文献只关注退伍军人或比较来自不同战争的退伍军人，通常不检查退伍军人和非退伍军人之间的健康轨迹差异。因此，该项目将使用来自健康和退休调查(MRS)的具有全国代表性的纵向数据来调查曾在军队服役和未在军队服役的男性的健康状况、自我评估健康、功能限制和残疾的轨迹。该项目的具体目标是：1)描述与服兵役有关的健康轨迹如何变化。2)明确入伍年龄、战时服役、服役年限和与军事有关的伤残是否对以后的健康轨迹有不同的影响。3)考察服兵役是否调节或缓和了早年不利因素对健康轨迹的影响。4)考虑中老年特征是否在早年不利因素或服兵役对晚年健康轨迹的影响中起中介作用。5)确定这些影响在不同历史时期服役的人群之间的差异程度。增长曲线模型将分别针对包括第一次世界大战、第二次世界大战、韩国和越南退伍军人在内的四个队列进行估计。此外，我们还考虑了服兵役、未观察到的HRS前死亡率选择以及MRS数据收集期间发生的死亡率选择的影响。总体而言，该项目将通过洞察特定历史时期对特定社会机构(即军队)的早期生活参与是否会影响导致晚年健康差距的累积(丧失)优势的过程，为老龄化科学做出贡献。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The question of how military service shapes men's life course trajectories has received limited but sustained attention in the literature for more than 25 years. Although there have been many studies that have examined psychological health, research on the impact of military service on physical health outcomes in later-life has been limited. There is a substantial literature on the physical health of veterans; however this literature focuses on veterans only or on comparisons of veterans from different wars, and often does not examine differences in health trajectories between veterans and nonveterans. Therefore, this project will use nationally representative longitudinal data from the Health and Retirement Survey (MRS) to investigate the trajectories of health conditions, self-rated health, functional limitations, and disability among men who did and did not serve in the military. The specific project aims are to: 1) Describe how health trajectories vary in relation to military service. 2) Specify whether enlistment age, wartime service, length of service, and military-related disability have different effects on later life health trajectories. 3) Examine whether military service mediates or moderates the effects of early-life disadvantage on health trajectories. 4) Consider whether mid- to late-life characteristics mediate the effects of early-life disadvantages or military service on later-life health trajectories. 5) Determine the extent to which these effects vary across cohorts who served during different historical time periods. Growth curve models will be estimated separately for four cohorts that include veterans of WWI, WWII, Korea, and Vietnam. In addition, we consider the effects of selection into military service, unobserved pre- HRS mortality selection, and mortality selection that occurred during the MRS data collection period. Overall, this project will contribute to the science of aging by providing insight into whether early-life participation in a particular social institution (i.e., the military) in specific historical periods shapes the process of cumulative (dis)advantage that leads to later-life health disparities.